As a blog-from-home mom, I don’t purchase much for my blog, but Tailwind is a must! Tailwind is a pinterest scheduler and if you have had a chance to research blogging you know Pinterest is the #1 key to growing your blog. To grow your blog on Pinterest you need to pin often and at the best times of day WITHOUT being “spammy.” Pinning at the perfect times all day is almost impossible for many moms who blog in their spare time.
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How to Grow Your Blog
Bonus: Tailwind Tribes
Plus you can join something called Tailwind Tribes. These Tribes allows bloggers to help and support each other. Basically for every pin you add to a Tribe, you must schedule someone else’s pin to one of your boards. In other words, you are pinning each other’s pins and thus increasing exposure of your pins! People will see your pins on other people’s Pinterest boards and possibly pin your pin. Then someone will see that pin and pin it again and so on and so on.
You can see why Tailwind is a must for bloggers who are trying to grow their blog AND still have time to do all the other things mom’s have to do.
As a dietitian who has a history of weight loss struggles, I am often asked to give my professional and personal opinion on what are the top keys to sustained weight loss. (You can read my weight loss story here).
This question has really gotten me thinking. What is my answer? First, we are all so different and complex. What works for one person may not work for another person. Plus we all have different goals and “healthy” does not look the same for everyone. One person may look different than someone else, but that doesn’t mean they are not BOTH healthy.
Being healthy is not about looks. Being healthy involves mind, body, and spirit. We all have areas we would like to improve. We are all continually growing and striving to live our healthiest life. In fact, growing, learning, and striving is what makes this beautiful journey called life a fun and exciting adventure.
This is why when I was in private nutrition counseling, I talked to my clients about what THEIR goals were. I tried to let the client take the lead as we talked about all aspects of life: mind, body, and spirit.
I wanted to preface again, that health and success are different for everyone and being complex human beings, one strategy may work for some people, but not for others. Dietitians are trained in motivational interviewing. With motivational interviewing, we let the client lead and try to answer client questions based on science. We help the client figure out what strategies THE CLIENT thinks will help them the most.
Why Are These My Top Weight Loss Tips?
With that being said, here are the key weight loss strategies that seemed to benefit the majority of my clients and me. These tips seem to work for many people because these strategies:
Reduce stress and anxiety
Simplify life
Require less willpower
Reduce food obsessing
Let us enjoy our food and help us with finding peace with food and out bodies.
And yes, help with weight loss
So here they are…
My Top 5 Weight Loss Tips
Create a healthy lifestyle friendly kitchen.
Notice that key tip number 3 is ‘eat at home more’. Tip number 3, however, doesn’t work as well without tip number 1.
When our kitchen is filled with delicious healthy foods, and if we eat at home most of the time, well, then we WILL eat healthy delicious foods most of the time.
There are many ways you can create a “Healthy Lifestyle Friendly Kitchen.”
Or you can learn how to organize your kitchen and have all your healthy breakfasts, lunches, and dinners prepared for the whole month in one day by reading the “Mindfulness in Faith and Freezer Meals” ebook. Talk about having a healthy lifestyle friendly kitchen! All your healthy meals for the whole month are done and ready to go!
Develop a healthy and SIMPLE routine
We are all creatures of habit. We crave whatever we are use to eating or doing. So if we develop a healthy routine or habit, then we, by nature, will WANT to stick to the routine. Think about brushing your teeth. This is such a part of our routine that if for some reason we can’t brush them, we are chomping at the bits to get home and get those teeth brushed. Or if you are use to eating a snack when you watch TV; then, when the TV comes on, something doesn’t seem right if you don’t have that snack. It takes time, but if we form healthy habits, they will become so routine that we will not feel right without doing them.
When clients develop a routine that involves eating healthy meals at home; then they were more likely to notice lasting changes.
So sit down and think of what you would like your routine to look like. Write down your routine. Think about your daily life, all your obligations, and activities. Include all of these into your routine. Your routine doesn’t have to be rigid, but we naturally form routines anyway, it might as well be a healthy one.
How are you going to incorporate eating at home into your routine? Are you going to meal plan and meal prep on Sundays? Are you going to follow a healthy eating cookbook to make your meals? Or is eating at home impossible right now? What does your dining out routine look like? How can your form some heathly dining out habits?
Mindfulness in Faith and Freezer Meals Helps with Tip #2
One strategy that has worked for me and many other busy families is cooking and freezing all your meals for a month in one day. Just like with Tip number 1, the “Mindfulness in Faith and Freezer Meals” ebook is meant to help you incorporate tip number 2 (Develop a Healthy and SIMPLE routine) into your life.
In this ebook you actually learn how to make a month of meals in one day. Many of the meals are slow cooker recipes, so as part of my routine, I just simply throw a meal in the crockpot while I am packing school lunches for the kids in the morning. Dinner is done!
Customize your Routine with “Mindfulness in Faith and Freezer Meals”
This ebook also provides other specific tips that you can pick and choose to incorporate into your daily routine.
Chapter 4 provides an interactive quiz called “What is Preventing You From Living Your Healthiest Life?” Remember when I said we are all complex and what works for some may not work for others? Well, this quiz helps you figure out what specific strategies you think will work for YOUR life.
Eat at home more than you eat out.
Time and time again, this seems to be a key tip for many. The problem is many of us are too busy to find the time to cook and eat at home. I know at our house we have something going on almost every night. We have games and acrobats class on Mondays, soccer on Tuesdays, Dance, book club, and cheer on Wednesdays, and soccer and scouts on Thursday. We are on the go all the time.
Mindfulness in Faith and Freezer Meals Helps with Tip #3
The make-ahead freezer meals in the “Mindfulness in Faith and Freezer Meals” ebook have been the key way I have been able to incorporate tip number 3 into our busy life. Because I have these meals already done, our weeknights are so much less stressful, and we are eating at home so much more. Before these freezer meals, we were eating out, grabbing snack foods, or getting take out all over the place. As a dietitian who loves to cook, but couldn’t find the time, I knew I needed to figure something out. This is when I became known as the freezer meal lady, and my family is now eating so much healthier. My husband even lost 17 pounds within the first few months of switching to this freezer meal lifestyle!
Mindfully Eat
I saved this one for last because it is near and dear to my heart. Mindfully eating has helped many with portion control and weight loss while simultaneously helping them stop food obsessing and find peace with food. With mindful eating you learn how to enjoy your food instead of seeing food as the enemy. On the Mindfulness in Faith and Food blog and in the “Mindfulness in Faith and Freezer Meals” ebook, you also learn how to not only enjoy your time eating, but also how to enjoy your time eating in the presence of God. You can learn how to mindfully eat by clicking here.
Find ways to be physically active on most days.
Physical activity doesn’t have to be an hour in the gym everyday. You can find many ways to be physically active. In fact, if you need some inspiration check out the posts below:
Of course, since these are the biggest keys to weight loss in my eyes, the “Mindfulness in Faith and Freezer Meals” ebook discusses all 5 keys in depth. If you want to learn more about this ebook click here.
Thanks for reading! Let me know what strategies have helped you grow and learn mentally, physically, and spiritually. Please fill free to share, like, or pin this if you found it helpful!
This week our whole state has been scurrying to get ready for the approaching hurricane, and my family is doing the same.
We found flashlights, made sure they all had fresh batteries, filled the bathtub with water, and bought emergency supplies. We also wanted to purchase plenty of food that you can eat that you don’t have to store in the fridge or freezer and you don’t have to cook. In other words, food you can store and eat when the power goes out.
When purchasing our emergency food, I wanted to make sure we were still getting plenty of nutrients by eating a somewhat balanced diet.
How To Stick with Your Healthy Lifestyle Goals Even at Social Gatherings
Honestly, social gatherings and parties are the hardest places for me to eat mindfully and sensibly. In fact, my overeating mostly happens at parties; however, these tips and trick have helped me and my clients eat more sensibly at parties. I hope you find some tricks that may help you too.
Instead of stressing about calories, focus on slowing down and enjoying your food. Make sure you put your fork down, slowly chew your food, and finally take a sip of your drink before picking up your fork to prepare your next bite.
Eat a healthy snack before you go to a party so that you are not starving when you get to there.
Don’t try everything at the party. Select small samples of the best at the table. Look at everything and rate the food before deciding what to get. If food isn’t a 10 then pass.
When people are bringing food, bring your own healthy food option for everyone to enjoy, and eat only your healthy food.
If the party is at your house, prepare only delicious healthy foods by using lower calorie versions of food and whole grains for your ingredients or using a healthy cookbook.
Volunteer to help so that you can do something else besides eating (Ex: blow up balloons)
Practice saying, “No thank you.” before hand.
Don’t stand near the food.
Pay attention to other joys around you, such as family and friends and the decor or environment.
Keep your hands busy by holding and sipping on a glass of water; sometimes we eat at parties just to be doing something or we feel like we want something in our hands.
Limit the alcohol; again hold a glass of water, diet soda, or diet lemonade.
Eat slowly from a plate. That way you won’t run out of food on your plate and go back for seconds. Just very slowly nibble food from your plate while you enjoy the party.
Sometimes you will eat more at a social gathering. Often times the problem is not how much we ate at the party, but more that we give up and overindulge as soon as we have eaten just a little bit more than usual. Sometimes we have an all or nothing approach. If a social gathering throws a kink into your routine, don’t just throw in the towel. Instead, focus on mindfully eating and enjoying your food slowly. You can be proud that you ate healthier than usual at a party even if you eat more than you usually do on a daily basis. For more information about mindful eating click here.
If you are looking for make ahead freezer meals that you can take to parties or eat at home, then you can find them in the “Mindfulness in Faith and Freezer Meals” ebook.
The “What is Preventing You From Living a Healthier Life?” interactive quiz
Mindful eating techniques and guide
A Complete Healthy Freezer Meal Plan: You will learn how to cook all of your breakfasts, lunches, and dinners for a whole month in ONE day. Don’t worry, I don’t just give you a bunch of recipes adn tell you to cook them in one day. The ebook includes strategies and “Pro Tips” on HOW to efficiently cook your meals in one day.
The goals of cooking all of your meals in ONE Day are:
More daily free time,
A decreased grocery bill,
Healthier meals for the whole family,
Less daily stress, and
Weight Loss/Weight Maintenance
Learn more about the “Mindfulness in Faith and Freezer Meals” eBook here.
Here are a Few Reviews for “Mindfulness in Faith and Freezer Meals”
“I have lost 17 pounds since I started eating these freezer meals. They are healthy AND taste great!!! We are now eating at home more, which has made a huge difference!” -Chad
“As I read this book, I kept thinking, ‘this is so much more than a freezer meal cookbook! Lacy needs to be a life coach! She has such a positive outlook on life!’ “The Mindfulness in Faith and Freezer Meals” ebook is so uplifting and encouraging!”
“I can actually see a decrease in my grocery bill since I started eating these freezer meals, and my kids love them! We are eating healthier now. Plus, we are eating more meals together as a family!” -Nicole
Want More?
If you would like to evaluate your own diet and determine which tips work best for you, please take the free DIY Diet self assessment and evaluation developed by a registered dietitian.
